Sunrise Service

It was dark when we walked up the cobblestone paths and climbed the flights of stairs to arrive at a place that overlooked the German city—the destination where we hosted our sunrise service on Easter morning. It was a beautiful experience to sing, share communion, and read the Bible with our group of approximately twenty people. As the sun came up, we prayed over the city.

We were up there by ourselves, except for a young Japanese man who was taking pictures. We had noticed that he didn’t leave after taking pictures, but that he was still there as we continued our service. A few people from our community talked to him and recognized that he did not speak German and that he knew very little English. It was challenging to communicate with him, though that didn’t prevent us from trying.

At the end of our service he accepted our invitation to join us for brunch. One of the German girls sat beside him during brunch and spoke to him using a translation app on her phone. The man was eager to know why we were celebrating, and this gave her the opportunity to share the Easter story with him. We answered a few questions he had and before he left, we prayed over him.

This was an opportunity for us to see how a missional community can impact someone, and how a community can be impacted by someone. We do not know how God is going to use the Gospel to speak to this young man, though we are confident that he had a hunger to learn.

Pray that God will continue to speak to this young man, and that his heart will be softened to the Gospel.

Praise God that this was an opportunity for us to be encouraged by how we can be a welcoming community.